Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon 2024 Holiday Book Bingo Challenge

Welcome to the Holiday Book Bingo Challenge portion of the 2024 Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon, hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer!

The sign-up page for the #2024HoHoHoRAT can be found here – and you’ll definitely want to find it so you can participate in ALL of the Elves’ Challenges.

The challenge here at Reading Reality is a Book Bingo. Complete one BINGO! (row, column or diagonal) to be entered into my $10 Amazon Gift Card giveaway (International winners can receive either an equivalent gift card from their local Amazon or a book from Better World Books). A coverall (complete the board) gets you a second entry!

When you complete a bingo, either comment on this post to let me know which line you’ve completed and with what books, or tag me on Instagram @reading_reality (that’s “reading underscore reality”) using the hashtag #2024HoHoHoRAT so I’m sure to get your entry. (Please be sure to include your link number from the sign up page HERE at Caffeinated Reviewer. Anyone can participate in the challenge but you must sign up for the Readathon to be eligible for the giveaway.)

Only one book per square and only one square per book. A Christmas mystery romance audiobook ARC with snow on the cover cannot be used to fill five boxes. Sorry not sorry.)

Let’s play BINGO!

 

~~~~~~ PARTICIPANT GIVEAWAY ~~~~~~

Claim your bingos here! (First bingo fill out the Rafflecopter, if you get a coverall please leave an additional comment. )

a Rafflecopter giveaway

#AudioBookReview: All By My Elf by Olivia Dade

#AudioBookReview: All By My Elf by Olivia DadeAll by My Elf (Under the Mistletoe Collection, #3) by Olivia Dade
Narrator: Andi Arndt
Format: audiobook, ebook
Source: purchased from Amazon, purchased from Audible
Formats available: ebook, audiobook
Genres: contemporary romance, holiday romance, short stories
Series: Under the Mistletoe #3
Pages: 55
Length: 1 hour and 28 minutes
Published by Amazon Original Stories on November 12, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

Secret crushes, spicy Christmas treats, heinous holiday traffic, and a fateful snowstorm bring good friends together in a funny, heartfelt short story by bestselling author Olivia Dade.
Nina and William are underpaid adjunct professors at the same university, where winter break is no break at all: ’tis the season to make extra money. When their holiday side hustle has them stranded by a blinding blizzard in the middle of nowhere, there’s nothing to do but cuddle up for warmth and play a game of Never Have I Ever to pass the time. But in the game of love, secrets never stay secret for long…
Olivia Dade’s All by My Elf is part of Under the Mistletoe, a stirring collection of December romances that thrill and tingle all the way. They can be read or listened to in one swoony sitting.

My Review:

What do you do with a used Weinermobile? Does what happens in the Weinermobile STAY in the Weinermobile? Have you ever wondered? Inquiring minds actually get to find out in All By My Elf.

The answers to those questions coincide with a few considerably less humorous and more down-to-earth questions about the lengths (pun definitely intended) that part-time college professors will go to in order to keep feeding their dreams of the ivory towers of academia while still managing to feed themselves on stipends that barely allow them to make ends wave at each other.

Most of all – and best of all – All By My Elf is a romance that satisfies the craving for a hot, steamy friends into lovers romance that toasts a nearly frozen night in a grey-market Weinermobile into a story that’s way bigger than even a 27 foot long hot dog in a bun – or equally long mincemeat-filled roll of phyllo dough in a Mincemobile – could ever manage to contain.

Escape Rating B: Believe it or not, the puns are part of the story – and they are groaners even when Adjunct Professors Nina Teems and William Dern aren’t moaning together in the back of the weiner.

(Speaking of groaners, if the title of this story is giving you an earworm that refuses to let itself be nailed down, that’s because the earworm is tripping over the slight difference between the book’s title and the song’s title, which is ‘All By Myself’, originally performed by Eric Carmen in 1975 but also covered by Sheryl Crow in 1993 and Céline Dion in 1996.)

So, even though there’s nothing either light or fluffy about a giant hot dog nestled in an even bigger bun – the story itself has plenty of both as well as being the perfect steamy antidote to all of Thanksgiving’s turkey and trimmings – not to mention the rock solid nature of some traditional holiday fruitcakes.

After yesterday’s book, which turned out to be more Xmas and less Halloween than I expected, I found myself looking for a lighter and fluffier story to ease us all into the holiday season and especially the 2024 Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon that begins tomorrow. I chose this particular short story in the Under the Mistletoe collection because I loved the author’s Spoiler Alert series and was hoping for some of the same laughs amid the romance.

Which I definitely got even if I’m not all that fond of hot dogs and I’ve never had mincemeat in any form – let alone this particular version – that I can recall. And I don’t think I’ll ever be able to even think of it again without giggling at least a bit.

All By My Elf takes a gigantic misunderstandammit and turns up the heat between two friends who have epic crushes on each other and are afraid to act on them. At least until the Mincemobile gets stuck in an epic blizzard and they need each other’s body heat to keep from freezing to death. (That’s not really a spoiler as this is a short story and the inevitable is so obvious it can be seen from outer space.) This scenario is one that gets used in romance and in fanfiction ALL THE TIME, and it’s a classic for a reason. It works. It really, really works – no matter how contrived the machinations for getting the couple into it.

If you’re looking for a quick read that combines warmth and heat and more than a few groaning laughs, All By My Elf is a fun, quick, read or listen to give you an excuse to put your feet up and your mind on coast for a few minutes during the busy holiday season.

 

#BookReview: Grimm Curiosities by Sharon Lynn Fisher

#BookReview: Grimm Curiosities by Sharon Lynn FisherGrimm Curiosities by Sharon Lynn Fisher
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: Gothic, historical fantasy, historical fiction, historical romance, paranormal, holiday fiction, holiday romance
Pages: 299
Published by 47North on November 5, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

In Victorian England, a young woman inherits her father’s curiosity shop and all its ghostly secrets in a bewitching novel by the author of Salt & Broom.

It’s 1851 in old York. Lizzy Grimm struggles to save her late father’s charmingly creepy yet floundering antique shop, Grimm Curiosities. Then, during a particularly snowy December in this most haunted city in England, things turn…curiouser.

Lizzy meets Antony Carlisle, whose sister suffers from the same perplexing affliction as Lizzy’s mother—both stricken silent and unresponsive after speaking with ghosts. Working closely together to fathom what power has transformed their loved ones and why, Lizzy and Antony discover an important her father’s treasured set of rare books on ancient folktales, enchantments, and yuletide myths. Books that a persistent collector is awfully keen to purchase. Books Lizzy can’t bear to sell.

Every bewitching passage and illustration opens a doorway to something ancient and dangerously inviting. Keys to a mystery Lizzy and Antony are compelled to solve—even if doing so means unleashing one of this bright holiday’s darkest myths.

My Review:

To paraphrase a much more famous Victorian Christmas ghost story, Herbert Grimm was dead, to begin with.

And, while he has a chance to rectify his mistakes and failures from the afterlife, it’s a job that’s much too big for any number of spirits to handle in just one night.

It’s 1851 in cold, snowy, OLD York, and Lizzy Grimm has been doing her best to maintain the curiosity shop she inherited from her father – as well as somehow keep body and soul together for both herself and her mother.

The problem for Lizzy, the many, many problems for Lizzy, is that entirely too many of her father’s former customers and suppliers, both, are unwilling to deal with a woman, and her mother is ill and can’t help with the shop. Mrs. Grimm has disconnected completely from the world and can’t even help herself without supervision.

The rent is 10 weeks behind and getting more behind by the day, Lizzy can barely keep herself and her mother fed and prevent them from freezing to death in the winter cold. Christmas is less than two weeks away and, while business always improves BEFORE the holiday, it hasn’t improved enough to see them through the dearth of the bitter months after.

Which is the day when two men of considerably better means than Lizzy enter the shop and each present her with potential solutions to her woes. Collector Ambrose Stokes wants to purchase some mysterious books of myth and legend that her father set aside with a note not to sell. Antony Carlisle comes in seeking a present for his younger sister. A sister who is in the exact same walking somnambulance state as Lizzy’s mother.

It’s clear from the beginning that Stokes only wants to use her to get at something he covets badly and probably shouldn’t have. Meanwhile Carlisle is obviously searching for both help and friendship – even if he doesn’t recognize that the latter is only a small portion of what he seeks in Lizzy’s company.

Stokes can solve her immediate financial difficulties, while Carlisle is likely to only cause her heartbreak – even if that is far, far, from his intention.

Between them, they open up her world to the true legacy that her father intended to leave her. A legacy that holds the key to every question she’s ever asked, and every answer she never thought she’d need.

Escape Rating B-: I picked this up because it looked like it was just the kind of horror-adjacent story that I generally enjoy. And because it was set in York, the setting of one of my favorite historical mystery series. (If you’re curious about the York of four centuries before this story, check out the Owen Archer series of historical mysteries, beginning with The Apothecary Rose. Because if there is one thing that Lizzy Grimm is right about, it’s that York is absolutely rife with stories just waiting to be told!)

So I was expecting a bit more Halloween and got a whole lot of the Victorian Christmas season instead – mixed with a trip to Narnia and more than a soupçon of historical romance. Even though even a soupçon of actual soup is something that Lizzy has been forced to worry about a LOT.

Also, and I know this is a ‘me’ thing and may not be a ‘you’ thing, Lizzy’s straddle of the line between having agency as the protagonist while being a woman of her time was even more uncomfortable for me than it was for her – and it was plenty uncomfortable for her. It just wasn’t what I was in the mood for and your reading mileage may definitely vary.

What was absolutely fascinating was the way that the supernatural and paranormal crept into the story on ghostly feet, that the gift she thought had passed her by was doing its damndest to warn her that she was heading for her own damnation if she didn’t figure out what was going on on both sides of the actual, honest-to-supernatural, wardrobe before it was too late.

From the standpoint of this reader, it felt like this story had too many irons in its fire. Each of the individual parts had the potential to be a whole, fascinating story, from the ghostly visitations to the world inside the cabinet, to the myths and legends coming to life to the mystery of just who the collector was and what he was up to and last but not least to the class-barrier hopping romance between Carlisle and Lizzy with Carlisle’s overbearing father serving as second-villain.

There were a LOT of fascinating story parts trying to weave themselves into a whole cloth – and they didn’t quite manage it and/or there wasn’t enough book for them to manage in. It had the bones of a good story – but either not quite enough bones or not enough flesh for the story-creature it was meant to be.

A- #BookReview: Feuds edited by Mercedes Lackey

A- #BookReview: Feuds edited by Mercedes LackeyFeuds (Tales of Valdemar#18) by Mercedes Lackey
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: anthologies, epic fantasy, fantasy
Series: Tales of Valdemar #18, Valdemar (Publication order) #59
Pages: 368
Published by DAW on November 26, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

This 18th anthology of short stories set in the beloved Valdemar high fantasy universe features tales by debut and established authors and a brand-new story from Mercedes Lackey.

The Heralds of Valdemar are the kingdom's ancient order of protectors. They are drawn from all across the land, from all walks of life, and at all ages—and all are Gifted with abilities beyond those of normal men and women. They are Mindspeakers, FarSeers, Empaths, ForeSeers, Firestarters, FarSpeakers, and more. These inborn talents—combined with training as emissaries, spies, judges, diplomats, scouts, counselors, warriors, and more—make them indispensable to their monarch and realm.

Sought and Chosen by mysterious horse-like Companions, they are bonded for life to these telepathic, enigmatic creatures. The Heralds of Valdemar and their Companions ride circuit throughout the kingdom, protecting the peace and, when necessary, defending their land and monarch.

Join a variety of authors as they ride with Mercedes Lackey to the beloved land of Valdemar and experience the many facets of this storied high fantasy realm.

My (very long) Review:

The individual volumes in the long-running Tales of Valdemar series (this is the EIGHTEENTH collection!) each center around a theme. The theme of this one is clear – as it says so right there on the label. Each of the stories herein centers on a feud. Not a battle, not a war, but a feud.

Think of the infamous Hatfields and the McCoys, names that we only still recognize because they had, you guessed it, a feud that lasted so long it made it into history and legend.

Feuds are usually not fun – and a lot of these stories are not. The collection is very good, but it isn’t nearly as lighthearted as the Shenanigans collection. Howsomever, there is still plenty to savor for repeat visitors to this fascinating world, while newcomers are sure to find something that will leave them thirsting for more – even if it’s not another story about food and drink as there are several of those in this year’s mix!

I picked this up because Valdemar is a world I knew I could slip into and be comforted as well as entertained – even though the theme of the collection isn’t necessarily comforting at all. And that’s exactly what happened.

Because I had such a good time – and ripped right through the whole thing without even bothering to come back to the ‘real world’ until I was finished, this is one of those times when each story is going to get a rating of its own and then I’ll attempt some very fudgy math to rate the whole.

“The Price of Anger” by Brigid Collins
This was a great story to kick off the collection of feuds because it’s a story about the costs of feuding. It’s also a story on two levels, as a young Farseer keeps seeing the ghosts of earlier students feuding while she dodges current students who can’t stop trying to exploit her gift. It’s only when she sees the results of the old feud that she understands that she’s falling into the same trap. Escape Rating A-

“Consequences” by Dylan Birtolo
It’s a stupid feud and an even stupider fight. Not that the story is remotely stupid, but the reader gets the same urge as the Herald – to knock some heads together in the hopes that some sense will break loose. It’s only when we see how things got this way, that a good idea once upon a time is having terrible consequences in the present that we see exactly how this particular road to hell got paved. Escape Rating B because it takes a bit to figure out that we’re seeing the story peel back in history for the point to come through.

“A Bad Business” by Jeanne Adams
A direct follow-up to the book Take a Thief (which I admit I have not read yet), this is a story about what happens in the aftermath of a horrific case. Just because the central villain has been removed from the equation it doesn’t mean that there aren’t still a whole lot of dirty loose ends to clean up. Even though I hadn’t read the case being wrapped up, this story is complete in itself and an appropriately messy clean up to a horrific case. Escape Rating B+

“A Tale of Two Cooks” by Charlotte E. English
This was one of the few relatively light-hearted stories in this collection and it made a refreshing change from the darker stories. Not that this couldn’t have turned dark as well, as it’s a case of too many cooks deliberately spoiling the soup – and the rest of the meal – in ways that could have been deadly. But the poisonous plans of the feuding foodies are thwarted by the quick decisions of one smart and able assistant and her cousin – a savvy Herald. Escape Rating A- because of the excellent way it relies on wits and banter to see its way clear to the solution.

“A Bite and a Pint” by Louisa Swann
Home may be the place that when you have to go there, they have to take you in. But that doesn’t mean they have to listen to you, not even when you come home after a year’s absence as a Herald Trainee on your way to the Collegium in Haven. A feud has broken out between the new Brewmistress of Petril’s tiny village and, unfortunately for him, his own mother. Each believes the other woman has poisoned her best goods, and it’s up to a boy that no one is quite yet willing to acknowledge is a man to find his way to the truth. This was another light story, the solution wasn’t really a surprise but it was a lot of fun getting there. Escape Rating B+

“Dueling Minstrels” by Jennifer Brozek and Marie Bilodeau
This is one of several stories about minstrels and minstrel rivalry in the collection. Minstrels Ozan and Aimar bring out both the best and the worst in each other. The worst behavior, and the best of their Bardic Gifts. But those gifts, combined with their ever-present feud, threaten to set their town literally on fire if they can’t find a way to make their rivalry work for them instead of against each other. Escape Rating B

“A Scold of Jays” by Elisabeth Waters
This is a story about karma being a right bitch – and deservedly so. A nobleman basically throws away his older son after an injury that will leave him with a limp – and not a single bit of other damage. That the nobleman disowns this boy as useless while continuing to indulge his self-indulgent, utterly villainous and downright murderous younger son results in exactly the situation one would hope for. Everyone involved gets EXACTLY what they deserve – many times over. This story is a direct follow-up to one that appeared in the earlier collection, Shenanigans, “A Cry of Hounds” and is even more fun as the karma continues to flow exactly where it should. Escape Rating A.

“Future-Proof” by J.L. Gribble
The feud in this particular story is a tragedy based on a fraud – with two young men paying the price for their elders’ evil deeds. Duri Phran and Cam Aylmer are both persona non grata among the unaffiliated noble students in the Collegium, forced to pretend to hate each other to keep their respective families from punishing them further. It’s only when they’re forced to work together that they realize that there is more wrong in both of their terrible situations that either imagined – and that salvation is waiting for them both if they can just manage to reach beyond what they’ve been taught. I had mixed feelings about this one because the ending felt a bit more deus ex companion than I wanted so Escape Rating B

“A Single Row of Vines” by Brenda Cooper
The setup for this story is similar to the one in Future-Proof, but this time it’s two young women on opposite sides of a village feud who are afraid to put that feud aside as Herald Trainees in Haven. This one worked better for me because the Companions refuse to solve their humans’ problem, instead the girls have to work it out in spite of the tremendous amount of indoctrination they’ve heard for their entire lives. Two girls alone can’t end 40 years of feuding – but they can make a start – and they do. Escape Rating A-

“Most True” by Kristin Schwengel
This one combines the minstrel rivalry of “Dueling Minstrels” with the “consequences” of the story of the same name. In this story, however, it’s those consequences that bring about the ending of the feud, as two gifted bards learn that they are only gifted enough to reach mastery if they reach for it together, and only AFTER the consequences of their feud have nearly ended one if not both of their careers before they’ve truly begun. Escape Rating B.

“Detours and Double Crosses” by Angela Penrose
A story about the cleverness of Bards, the foolishness of people who try to use those Bards in their own nefarious schemes and the stubbornness of one Bard Trainee who proves to herself that she’s more than good enough to become a full bard by saving a young heir from a deadly plot by chasing a villain down no matter how fast he runs. This story was typical of these collections in all the best ways and I fell right into it. Escape Rating A-

“Trade is Trade” by Fiona Patton
As an earlier story was all about food – it’s fitting that this one is all about drinks. Or at least the bragging rights thereto. The feud is entirely predictable – as are the results. The Crown is planning to give a plaque to the oldest pub in Haven. The Guards really, really, really want the Crown to get on with it, because the rash of trouble-making and sign-stealing is driving them to more drink than they can collectively afford. As this story reminds me a great deal of the Discworld  City Watch  subseries AND it’s a loose follow-up to one of my favorite stories in the Anything with Nothing collection, “Look to Your Houses”, Escape Rating A.

“By the Ticking of My Thumbs” by Rosemary Edghill
A really interesting take on feuding as the feud is, literally, all in their heads. There’s no precipitating event, no history, and the participants have never even met. But they really, really should have. The whole feud is based entirely on their assumptions about each other, and those assumptions have thoroughly made asses out of both of them. It’s sad but fascinating to watch them assign motives to each other that have no basis in anything – and such a beautiful catharsis when they finally figure out where they both went so terribly wrong. Escape Rating A.

“Harmony” by Anthea Sharp
Another story about feuding, dueling bards, there isn’t much harmony in this story – which is the point. Because this is very much a story about pride going before a really, really big fall, and how beautiful music can only be made out of, well, harmony. Not just the harmony of the notes and the melody, but the harmony among the people – ALL THE PEOPLE – who take part in the performance. That age and experience manage to outwit youth, skill and hubris added just the right bit of tartness to an excellent story. Escape Rating A

“Playing Peacemaker Once More” by Dee Shull
Considering the title, it’s a bit of a surprise that this is actually a story about boundaries. Specifically about defending one’s own even as one does their best to get others to examine the placement of theirs. Like the final story in this collection, Uncivil Blood, there’s a bit of a Romeo and Juliet aspect – or perhaps that should be Romeo and Tybalt – to this one that gets worked out much better than Shakespeare’s famous tragedy. Escape Rating B

“Pairmates” by Ron Collins
This one didn’t quite work for me, which I was really sad about as it’s the one story in this collection that features nonhuman protagonists. I think it just passed me by a bit because I couldn’t place it in Valdemar history and wasn’t quite sure how it fit to the overall world or when. I wanted to like it more than I did but I had too many nagging questions at the end. Escape Rating C.

“Battle of the Bands” by Dayle A. Dermatic
This battle of the bands is a family feud, as brothers Eldriss and Davon haven’t spoken to each other in years because Davon claimed that Eldriss stole his sweetheart and married her. Beyond the fact that Shalna isn’t an object to be stolen, that claim is more of an excuse than a reason. Eldriss just wants his brother back, and a mixup at a musical contest – where the brothers enter as the leaders of competing bands – gives them the opportunity they’ve been waiting for for over a decade. A good story with a happy but not surprising ending. Escape Rating B.

“Tangles” by Diana L. Paxson
The feud in this particular instance is a feud between rival shopkeepers who are determined to keep far away from each other in spite of being located in the save Haven district. However, this is also a story about two determined – and somewhat magical – pieces of furniture that make a matched set that are equally determined to be put back together. To the point where they throw a bit of magic in the way of the best person to untangle a web that goes back decades. There are several Romeo and Juliet-type stories in this collection and this one is another, but it’s marvelously twisted because the feud happened because they didn’t marry – although it’s still not too late to fix things the way they should have been! Escape Rating A

“Payment in Kind” by Stephanie Shaver
The title is in reference to what happens when a cheating landholder stiffs a bard for her fee. But underneath that is the saddest story in this collection on multiple fronts as the problem set before that bard and her Herald twin-brother is about a whole village being oppressed by that rapacious landholder – who is also a liar and a cheat – a healer caught between her oaths and her duty, child labor and child murder, and one woman with cancer who wants one last day in the sun – even as she keeps her condition a secret from those she loves the most. Escape Rating A+.

“A Determined Will” by Paige L. Christie
This is a story about going home and discovering that the things you remember aren’t quite what you thought they were – unless they are and someone is trying to swindle you. This one was surprisingly fun in spite of itself, as Guard Trainee Teig has come home to bury the closest thing she had to a father. That he left her everything he had isn’t really the point – it’s more of the last note of a memory. But when someone arrives out of nowhere and attempts to cheat her out of it, she puts all of that Guard training to excellent use! Escape Rating A.

“The Ballad of Northfrost” by Phaedra Weldon
This is a hard, bitter story with an excellent satisfying ending. Reyes fate reads like many of the videogames I love. He’s wounded, near death, in the dark, between a rock and a very hard place, determined to get justice for people long dead who once saved him and set him on his path. That his own ghosts rise to help him take the final steps to safety, freedom and resolution was a bright candle in a very dark story with just the right and necessary ending. Escape Rating A+

“Uncivil Blood” by Mercedes Lackey
A much better version of Romeo and Juliet, with more political shenanigans, considerably fewer deaths, a more sensible ending, and the reappearance of one of Valdemar’s favorite characters who has not graced the stage for entirely too many years. This was my favorite story in the collection, Escape Rating A+.

Escape Rating Overall A-: This was as grand a trip to Valdemar as I hoped it would be. My favorite story in the collection was “Uncivil Blood” by Mercedes Lackey herself, followed by “The Ballad of Northfrost” by Phaedra Weldon and “Payment in Kind” by Stephanie Shaver. If you’ve EVER visited Valdemar this is a great time and a great way to go back for a return trip!

The Sunday Post AKA What’s on my (Mostly Virtual) Nightstand 11-17-24

It’s beginning to look a lot like…it’s getting much too close to the holidays! Thanksgiving is less than two weeks away, and it’s time for Caffeinated Reviewer’s annual Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon. Reading Reality is one of her elves this year, so my challenge post is coming up OMG THIS THURSDAY!

Speaking of the holidays, and the season, and everything, today’s cat pic is Hecate, managing to show off that she is both a bit round like a pumpkin AND has pumpkin colored patches on her underside that match the floor a whole lot more than I thought.

Current Giveaways:

$10 Gift Card or $10 Book PLUS EVENT-WIDE AMAZON/PAYPAL PRIZE in the Late Fall Giveaway Event!
$10 Gift Card or $10 Book in the Fall 2024 Seasons of Books Giveaway Hop

Winner Announcements:

The winner of the Thanks a Latte Giveaway Hop is Cindy

Blog Recap:

#GuestPost: Veterans Day 2024: Readings
A- #BookReview: The Bloodless Princes by Charlotte Bond
A+ #BookReview: The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong
A- #AudioBookReview: Crazy as a Loon by Hailey Edwards
B #AudioBookReview: The President’s Brain is Missing by John Scalzi
Stacking the Shelves (627)

Coming This Week:

Feuds by Mercedes Lackey (#BookReview)
We Solve Murders by Richard Osman (#BookReview)
Grimm Curiosities by Sharon Lynn Fisher (#BookReview)
Ho-Ho-Ho Readation 2024 Book Bingo Challenge (#2024HOHOHORAT)
The December Market by RaeAnne Thayne (#2024HOHOHORAT #BookReview)

Stacking the Shelves (627)

Lots of pretty amid not so many covers this week. It’s November, and publishing looks like its already headed into the holiday doldrums. Not that the holidays themselves are doldrum-y, but rather that not much comes out or gets promoted over the holidays because no one is paying attention to anything EXCEPT the holidays!

I almost said that there isn’t an ugly cover in the bunch, but I  have to admit that the beady eye of whatever that insect is pictured on the cover of Esperance is definitely giving me the creeps. I’m curious as hell because I loved the author’s Braking Day. But still, that cover is really kind of creepy – and potentially crawly as well.

The Ladies Road Guide to Utter Ruin, however, gets my nod for both prettiest cover and most eye-catching title, but your reading mileage may vary. We’ll have to see in the months ahead.

For Review:
The Enchanted Greenhouse by Sarah Beth Durst
Esperance by Adam Oyebanji
The Ladies Road Guide to Utter Ruin (Ill-Mannered Ladies #2) by Alison Goodman
Murder at Gulls Nest (Nora Breen Investigates #1) by Jess Kidd
A Shipwreck in Fiji (Sergeant Akal Singh #2) by Nilima Rao

Purchased from Amazon/Audible/Etc.:
All by My Elf (Under the Mistletoe #3) by Olivia Dade (ebook + audio)
Bayou Book Thief (Vintage Cookbook Mystery #1) by Ellen Byron


If you want to find out more about Stacking The Shelves, please visit the official launch page

Please link your STS post in the linky below:


#AudioBookReview: The President’s Brain is Missing by John Scalzi

#AudioBookReview: The President’s Brain is Missing by John ScalziThe President's Brain Is Missing by John Scalzi
Narrator: P.J. Ochlan
Format: audiobook, ebook
Source: purchased from Amazon, purchased from Audible
Formats available: ebook, audiobook
Genres: humorous science fiction, science fiction, short stories
Pages: 29
Length: 47 minutes
Published by Macmillan Audio, Tor Books on July 12, 2010
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBetter World Books
Goodreads

The question is, how can you tell the President's brain is missing? And are we sure we need it back?

My Review:

My brain is toast today which is what caused me to pull this book and audio out of the virtually towering TBR pile. I was looking for a bit of a laugh, something lighthearted that wouldn’t tax my own poor missing brain too much – and this certainly delivered!

It starts out with a simple but confounding idea. What if the brain of the President of the United States went missing? I don’t mean surgically removed or shot out or anything even remotely logical. But what if the President woke up one morning, felt a bit lightheaded, and his doctor did all the obvious tests and a few less obvious tests and determined that there was a void in his cranium where his brain matter was supposed to be.

And that he was otherwise healthy and as operational as he ever was.

It’s a crisis – and it’s a conundrum. There are plenty of jokes about whether anyone will notice that this particular president no longer has a brain. Likewise, plenty of people would notice if the president dropped dead because his brain had gone walkabout. Just because he seems to be fine – at the moment – doesn’t mean he will continue to be fine under the circumstances.

The human body is not meant to function without something up there.

So one poor low-level staffer is assigned to figure out what happened before they have to tell the president what happened. Because he’s not going to take it well – AT ALL. Who would?

That assignment that leads from the White House to an old high school buddy to Area 51 to white panel vans to, well, back to the White House. After the dust has settled and the crisis hasn’t so much been resolved as expanded and made totally moot – at the same time.

Escape Rating B: This turned out to be exactly what I was looking for. It was light, short and fun. It also, surprisingly, is NOT a commentary on any of the parties in the recent election – or the one before that or the one before that. The President’s Brain is Missing was originally published in 2010. It took me a while to remember which president this particular lack of braininess would have been lampooning at THAT time – but once I did it worked even better than it had initially.

And it most certainly did work.

It did remind me more than a bit of the author’s When the Moon Hits Your Eye in the sense that the crisis is just so completely off the wall and comes out of absolute nowhere. Although this story about the President’s missing brain did a much better job at, at least, nodding towards causality than Moon did and I liked it more for that.

Part of what made this so much fun is that it took me back both to a more innocent time – as strange as that seems – and it reminded me of a whole lot of wonderfully strange and geeky science fiction into the fun bargain.

There’s the obvious take off on the Star Trek: The Original Series episode Spock’s Brain – which was a terrible episode. At least Spock’s missing brain was considerably more apparent, as, after all, Spock USES his.

In addition to the multiple nods to Trek, and the beautifully played reference to the extremely applicable Clarke’s Law (Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,) I also got some whiffs of nostalgia about the X-Files and even a touch of Stargate. The X-Files were specifically mentioned, but so was Area 51 where Stargate Command had a base that dealt with alien technology.

The President’s brain may, or may not, have been missing – or maybe it’s Schrodinger’s Brain after all – but the author’s deft touch with science fiction humor was certainly present. And this story turned out to be the perfect listen for my own missing brain to wrap up the week.

A- #AudioBookReview: Crazy as a Loon by Hailey Edwards

A- #AudioBookReview: Crazy as a Loon by Hailey EdwardsCrazy as a Loon (Yard Birds #1) by Hailey Edwards
Narrator: Stephanie Richardson
Format: audiobook, ebook
Source: purchased from Amazon, purchased from Audible
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: paranormal, urban fantasy
Series: Yard Birds #1
Pages: 133
Length: 4 hours
Published by Black Dog Books, Tantor Audio on July 4, 2023
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Ellie Gleason has protected the town of Samford, Alabama for decades. It’s not as glamours as her glory days as the WitchLight Hub, but it keeps her active during her golden years.
Life is good.
Well, it’s okay.
Fine.
It could be bloodier with a smidge more gore, but retirement is meant to be low-key. It’s not like her fragile bones could handle the strenuous hunt for monsters anymore, even if her current duties are dull as dishwater.
But when her great-nephew shows up on her doorstep in tears—or is he her great-great nephew?—begging for help, Ellie straps on her beloved shotgun, Bam-Bam, and gets the coven back together.
Sure, Betty just had a hip replacement, and Flo would rather flirt than fight, and Ida is busy with her anniversary plans, and Joan is…Joan. But Ellie is certain she can whip the girls into shape in time to defeat the creature preying on kids at a nearby summer camp. She might even have them home in time for dinner.

My Review:

Ellie Gleason isn’t, really, and neither are the rest of her friends. Well, maybe Joan is just a bit. Crazy as a loon, I mean. None of them are crazy, loony or otherwise, no matter how much Ellie might fake it by running around the tiny town of Samford, Alabama in her housecoat with ‘Bam-Bam’ strapped to her back.

Bam-Bam is her shotgun. And nope, still not crazy.

Because when you’re still patrolling as a working member of Witchlight – even if you are in your second century – it’s better to be armed as well as dangerous. Which Ellie and the rest of her coven certainly are. Even if it takes them a little longer to get to the scene of the crime.

Or, for that matter, to the point of any discussion, because they’ve been together so damn long that there are plenty of times when the pointed barbs and the old grudges take over the planning of any and every op.

It’s mostly small town stuff – because they’re not the top tier of Witchlight operators no matter how much they all still wish they were kicking ass and taking names and riding monsters to the rescue. So when this case literally crawls into their laps, they’re all a bit giddy with the adrenaline of the chase.

Even if the person at the heart of the mess is a child under their protection. Particularly because another member of their family is doing their damndest to keep it from them.

They may not be what they used to be – but when one of their cubs is threatened it brings out the mama bear in every single one of them. Even if not one of them shifts into an actual bear. That’s okay. After all, one of their sons is bear-shifter enough to handle THAT part of the job.

Escape Rating A-: I picked up this book and audiobook, in fact this whole, entire series, on a recommendation from Caffeinated Reviewer. I caught her review of the third book in the series, Free as a Bird, and had to ask myself where had this been all my life and how had I missed it?

Based on this first book, this series is an absolute hoot from beginning to end. It was also the perfect book for this week as it is a hilarious pick-me-up with a heart wrapped around found family and lifelong sisterhood.

The combination of elements got me from the opening paragraphs. Because this takes off from the same premise as one of my favorite urban fantasies, A Key, an Egg, an Unfortunate Remark, but goes about it differently.

That book, and I still mourn that it was only ever the one, took off from a question about what happens to all those young, limber, kickass urban fantasy protagonists if they survive to middle age and even older. Marley Jacob got herself a kickass sidekick and went about her own personal kickassery through negotiation and mediation once the years caught up with her.

Ellie and her coven have just kept on kicking – even as they also kick against the inevitable slowing down of age. They use magic to slow down slowing down – and then they do too much and pay the price later. But they all refuse to quit even as they are forced to change gears.

They’re a LOT like the sisterhood of retired spies turned assassins in Killers of a Certain Age – complete with the sharply pointed banter and the lifelong grudges. So if you liked that and want to give urban fantasy a try, you’ll love Ellie and her Yard Birds.

The case here, and there certainly is one, does a great job of introducing Ellie and her sisters and setting up their family situation – which is just a bit complicated – while giving them a case that is close to their hearts even as it shines a light on just what sorts of things can go wrong in a world where the paranormal exists but still has to keep itself under wraps.

And then the case managed to tie itself back into the reason they all got involved in the first place, as both the evil they fight and the reason they’re fighting it come from the same place – a mother’s love.

The story is told from inside Ellie’s snarky head – and I loved every minute of it. The narrator, Stephanie Richardson, captured the essence of Ellie perfectly, so I’m very happy that she is the narrator for the whole series so far.

I only have two quibbles about this whole experience. One is that I wish there were more. Which there is, of course, as the second and third books, Dead as a Dodo and Free as a Bird, are already out and I already have them.

But the second is that I hope those later books resolve a niggle left over from this one. They did solve the case. They absolutely did. But there was a dangling potential co-conspirator left in their midst. I may be wrong about their co-conspirator status, but there was something rotten left in the heart of the family that got a rug pulled over it. I hope that rug gets pulled back in the books ahead.

I’m certainly there for it. I definitely want to hear as much more from Ellie as I can get!

A+ #BookReview: The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong

A+ #BookReview: The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie LeongThe Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, large print, paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: cozy fantasy, cozy mystery, fantasy
Pages: 336
Published by Ace on November 5, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

A wandering fortune teller finds an unexpected family in this warm and wonderful debut fantasy, perfect for readers of Travis Baldree and Sangu Mandanna.
Tao is an immigrant fortune teller, traveling between villages with just her trusty mule for company. She only tells "small" fortunes: whether it will hail next week; which boy the barmaid will kiss; when the cow will calve. She knows from bitter experience that big fortunes come with big consequences…
Even if it’s a lonely life, it’s better than the one she left behind. But a small fortune unexpectedly becomes something more when a (semi) reformed thief and an ex-mercenary recruit her into their desperate search for a lost child. Soon, they’re joined by a baker with a knead for adventure, and—of course—a slightly magical cat.
Tao sets down a new path with companions as big-hearted as her fortunes are small. But as she lowers her walls, the shadows of her past are closing in—and she’ll have to decide whether to risk everything to preserve the family she never thought she could have.

My Review:

Tao tells small fortunes. Only small fortunes. Just as it takes a big risk to win a big reward, it takes big magic to tell big fortunes. Which also results in big risks that Tao is simply not willing to, well, risk.

The only big fortune Tao ever told resulted in a big disaster. Her father was killed, her village was destroyed, her mother married a foreigner, took Tao away from home and raised her among strangers who could never get past her origins. And who seemingly could never forgive the girl for the turn in the family’s, well, fortunes.

So Tao took to the road, with her small cart and her small fortunes, doing her best to make enough money to keep body and soul together and on the road, touring small towns, never touching the greater magics that would foretell death and disaster and bring the empire’s witchfinders down upon her bowed head.

The rounds of Tao’s quiet and unassuming life are disrupted when she tells what she believes is a small fortune for a traveling mercenary. She sees him greet his little girl in front of what appears to be their home. A simple, everyday sort of fortune.

But the little girl has been missing for months and months, and her father and his friend – a semi-reformed thief – have themselves taken to the roads in search of the little girl’s whereabouts – or at least her fate.

This seemingly small fortune is huge. It is life-altering. Finding his little girl safe and sound will change everything for the mercenary – and he is determined to stick with Tao until that vision becomes truth.

The linking of his quest to her vision is the seed of change. As her vision leads him from clue to clue and village to village, their little band turns into a found family – a family that in turn is found by a series of small fortunes with big implications as the wheels of her cart grind their way to the fortune that Tao has been avoiding for all of her journeying.

It takes her home – to the home she never thought she could go back to – and to the one she never imagined she’d ever be able to make even for herself.

Escape Rating A+: This OMG DEBUT novel is just marvelous. I went into it expecting something light and cozy and certainly got that, but it’s just such a terrific story that hits so many excellent notes and is deeper than I was expecting by a whole lot.

It’s like every time the story takes just a bit of a twist it also digs more deeply into the heart – both Tao’s and the reader’s at the same time.

A big part of the story, and certainly the form of it, is the journey. Tao is traveling, endlessly traveling, because she’s rootless. She has no place that calls her home. So a big part of her starting out is an immigrant’s journey. Her mother brought her out of their country of Shinn to the country of their rival, Eshtera. Tao is never accepted as Eshteran because of her Shinian (read Asian) appearance, but she and her mother drifted apart so she doesn’t remember the culture of her origins. She’s lost without a true place of her own.

Her Esteran stepfather tried to forcibly graft her into Eshtera through marriage, but that was doomed to fail – so she fled. Her magic marks her as dangerous but the power of it is coveted – so she hides from the Empire.

She’s alone and feels doomed to remain so.

Her journey, that thing that keeps her isolated, is her salvation, and the story becomes Tao picking up a band of ‘strays’ much like herself and becoming the center of a found family – a family that she is willing to step WAY out of her comfort zone to protect, which in turn saves her as well as them.

And as the members of her little tribe each find their way into her heart, they all find their way into the reader’s as well.

A surprising readalike for this book is A Psalm for the Wild Built, which isn’t fantasy at all. But the journeys and the discoveries and the found family aspects are very similar, as is the way that Sibling Dex in Psalm becomes a big part of each of the places she visits even as she makes her own found family with the robot.

More than Legends and Lattes, which seems to be listed as the go-to readalike for every cozy fantasy, The Teller of Small Fortunes reminded me a whole lot more of the Mead Mishaps series. Not the romantic aspects of that series, but rather the way that both stories start out at a very light level and turn out to be important quest journeys with much larger implications and big found family elements by the time they reach their HEAs.

Very much like the other cozy fantasy series(es), however, The Teller of Small Fortunes is a story where there is not a villainous villain in sight. Instead, there are bad things that have happened to good people that get resolved through mostly human agency even as those humans make human mistakes along the way.

This isn’t a BIG story. There’s no big bad and there’s no big battle and it’s not a big contest between good and evil. Instead it’s a gentle story about people finding their way and finding that their way goes better when they go together.

It’s lovely and you’ll turn the last page with a smile and some days those are just the kind of stories we all need. When it’s your turn to need one of those kinds of stories, pick up this book. I’ll be eagerly awaiting her next.

A- #BookReview: The Bloodless Princes by Charlotte Bond

A- #BookReview: The Bloodless Princes by Charlotte BondThe Bloodless Princes (The Fireborne Blade, #2) by Charlotte Bond
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, ebook, audiobook
Genres: dragons, fantasy
Series: Fireborne Blade #2
Pages: 160
Published by Tordotcom on October 29, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Orpheus meets A Natural History of Dragons in a tale of death, honor and true love's embrace.
It seemed the afterlife was bustling.
Cursed by the previous practitioner in her new role, and following an... incident... with a supremely powerful dragon, High Mage Saralene visits the afterlife with a boon to beg of the Bloodless Princes who run the underworld.
But Saralene and her most trusted advisor/champion/companion, Sir Maddileh, will soon discover that there's only so much research to be done by studying the old tales, though perhaps there's enough truth in them to make a start.
Saralene will need more than just her wits to leave the underworld, alive. And Maddileh will need more than just her Fireborne Blade.
A story of love and respect that endures beyond death. And of dragons, because we all love a dragon!

My Review:

The road to hell isn’t paved with good intentions – it isn’t paved at all. Instead it’s a dropkick off of a VERY high bridge into a pit that the evil exilarch from The Fireborne Blade is trying to avoid by dragging his successor, Saralene, into the afterlife in his place.

This follow-up to The Fireborne Blade is a book that this reader never expected at all. Because at the end of The Fireborne Blade it seemed like the story was all wrapped up.

The dragon was dead, to begin with.

The dragon was dead, the disgraced knight Maddileh was redeemed, the Fireborne Blade was restored, the evil exilarch was dead, Maddileh’s betraying, body-stealing squire was dead – in exchange for Maddileh herself – and the true High Mage Saralene is back on her throne and in her office, with Maddileh as her bodyguard and captain.

All is right with their world – or would be if all of the above were as true as Maddileh and Saralene believed them to be at the end of that first book.

The adventures of this second book are necessary because those things are not true. In fact they are mostly not true. Especially the parts that have the worst potential outcomes.

The dragon is not really dead – only hibernating. The evil exilarch is dead – but he’s scheming from the afterlife to take Saralene’s body and her position and go right back to being the oppressive tyrant he was when he was alive. Because he will be. Again.

Unless Maddileh and Saralene can stop him – with the surprisingly willing assistance of the dragon they believed they killed.

All they have to do is convince the ‘Bloodless Princes’ who control the Underworld to let Saralene go – before she’s dead forever.

Escape Rating A-: The pattern of the way both books in this series are written is fascinating and more than a bit different. This story – as did The Fireborne Blade – works on two tracks that feed into each other in ways that the reader does not initially expect.

A piece of this story is told through tales that are myths and legends to Maddileh and Saralene – and then the actions they are actually performing move the story forward. Then it circles back to more legends – which inform the action to come.

What made the tales part of the action work was that those tales are told from two perspectives, the human and the dragon. Those points of view permeate these stories that talk about the same basic event but come to rather different conclusions and teach different lessons beyond the obvious one that whoever controls the recording of history sets the agenda for what history is believed to be – as opposed to what it really was.

All of which comes fully into play when Maddileh, Saralene and the dragon Mienylyth reach the Underworld, because the legends of the ‘Bloodless Princes’ have conflated order with good and chaos with evil, when in truth a LOT of time has passed, both princes’ attitudes have become set in very hard stone and either condition taken to extremes is no good for humans or other thinking creatures.

The whole, entire story kicks off with Maddileh and Saralene learning that the righteous ending they believed they’d earned at the end of their first adventure wasn’t an ending at all. This second adventure takes that fruit-basket upset and turns it into a story of adventure and upended assumptions that crosses the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice with Lady Trent’s memoir, A Natural History of Dragons (by Marie Brennan) and turns it into a romance of longing and unfulfilled hopes and dreams that can only become an HEA if all the characters hold true to their oaths and their promises.

As much as the story is told from Maddileh’s and Saralene’s perspectives – as much as their human hopes and dreams drive the narrative forward – it’s the lonely dragon Mienylyth who steals the story and the reader’s heart.

I think this is the end of this saga – but then I thought that last time. If we get to see more of Maddileh and Saralene after all, I really hope that Mienylyth flies back as well. Because she was absolutely chock full of awesome – even when she was pretending to be a cat.